


let him plead for himself

by warandrunning



Category: Dishonored (Video Games)
Genre: and the Mark is pretty much all that's keeping him alive, feat. semi-religious rituals and black magic, in which Corvo is a human disaster
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-06
Updated: 2017-08-06
Packaged: 2018-12-11 19:57:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11721465
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/warandrunning/pseuds/warandrunning
Summary: “If he is a god, let him plead for himself, because his altar has been torn down!” Judges 6:31Corvo isn’t a religious man, but this isn’t religion.





	let him plead for himself

Corvo Attano, the disgraced Lord Protector, masked and bloodied and marked with strange abilities (or so it’s said) — that Corvo Attano — sets the runes just so, clenches his fist to keep his fingers still. One hand goes to the hilt of his sword, anticipating.

It’s the same every time; he’s lost count of how many variations on this theme, now. A week, two — three, if he’s lucky — before the shivers settle in, and his ruined knee begins to ache, and these Void-cursed abilities fade from his grasp.

Corvo’s never considered himself a religious man. But this isn’t religion. This is — well, he doesn’t know, entirely. Ignorance is bliss, he’s heard, but he’s about as far from bliss as he can fucking imagine, standing in this condemned apartment with the runes’ sickly purple glow throwing shadows on the rotting walls.

He sucks in his breath, fighting back nausea, hard and slick and sour in his throat. A symptom, maybe, or just anticipation, though he can’t say which with any certainty. He closes his eyes, listens to the blood rushing in his ears, following it to the point where it twists into the scraping croon of the runes. Right — _there_ —

His sword is in his hand, drawing over the flat of his left palm. Scar tissue splits, spilling red-black blood that drips, drips, onto the runes, and oh, how they sing for it. The drops spit and sizzle on the surface of the bone, the cut in his palm aching with it — it hurts more, he thinks, than his many other wounds do. He’s not sure why (not sure he wants to know).

Anyway. The bone has the blood, and it wicks it up greedily, hissing and spitting and singing. Of its own will, almost, Corvo’s hand presses wide and flat against the closest rune, giving more blood — as much as it will take, until he feels the air… shift. The candles, wax dripping and mingling with the blood on the rickety table, gutter in a swirl of breeze that smells of seawater and mold.

Corvo has no desire to open his eyes to what he knows has apparated before him. He takes one deep, shaky breath — teeth clenched against the stench — then another, as if this tainted oxygen could expel the dread pooling in the cavity of his chest.

A voice, low and lilting in harmony with the runes’ song, interrupts that futile process. “Oh, my dear Corvo.”

Corvo wipes his blade, sheaths it deliberately before opening his eyes to the figure he’s called forth. The swirling purple-black of the Void masks most of his body, hovering above the makeshift altar. It shouldn’t bother Corvo anymore — he should be used to it — but his jaw juts in defiance when he has to crane his neck to meet those bottomless black eyes.

Corvo doesn’t speak.

The Outsider hums, and Corvo can feel it reverberate in his chest. “You look like you’ve seen better days. How are you _feeling_?”

Corvo shifts, bending slightly at the knee to relieve the pressure, then folds his arms across his chest and wills his hands to stop their trembling.

The Outsider’s smile — if you could call it that — is faint and knowing. “So you aren’t here to talk. To what _do_ I owe this distinct pleasure, oh Lord Protector?”

“You know why we’re here,” Corvo grinds out.

The Outsider sighs, then reaches out a hand, palm up and beckoning. “Let me see.”

Corvo’s palm is tacky with drying blood, and his fingers stick when he unfolds his arms and loosens his fist. He averts his eyes — he knows what the Mark looks like all the same, shimmering with that insidious purple-black glow, and cold, so cold it burns.

His hand reaches, Mark up, toward the Outsider. The relief when their palms meet leaves Corvo gasping, knees buckling. As Corvo falls to the rotted floor, his fingers tighten around the Outsiders’ in spite of himself.

“It’s been too long, Corvo,” the Outsider chides. “You must… take better care of yourself.”

With that, he yanks Corvo’s hand toward him, though it’s too much to ask Corvo to get back to his feet. The Outsider’s hand is cold and stiff as the grave, fingers leaving dark imprints around his wrist. Corvo shudders, the whole of him cringing away from the unwelcome presence. But the Mark anchors him in place, and Corvo feels the pull of energy between him and the Outsider: leaching tentacles that both steady Corvo and leave him shaking, shaken.

Time twists strangely around the Outsider, and Corvo has no idea how long he kneels there, with his arm wrenched uncomfortably above him. The runes’ song grows until it dominates Corvo’s mind — no sight, no smell, no other sound but that mournful creaking scrape, and above it, the Outsider starts humming softly. It’s slow, nearly tuneless, but Corvo recognizes the song all the same.

_I dreamed my love came in my sleep_  
_Lowlands, Lowlands away_  
_Her cheeks are wet, her eyes did weep_  
_Lowlands away_

Corvo goes rigid. He endures this curse, makes use of the powers it has bestowed upon him. But it’s — too much, this taunting, smug reminder of why he is here at all; Corvo’s pulled out of this Void-induced trance, and Jessamine’s face swirls before him, her voice a slow susurrus, indistinct waves breaking at the edge of his hearing.

He tries to reach toward her, but he’s stuck — half-prone, arm held aloft, he can’t break free — and a voice dispels the vision of his empress.

“Leaving so soon?” The Outsider’s grip on his wrist tightens, painfully. The air moves, and then the Outsider’s other hand is on Corvo’s shoulder, pinning him in place. “Oh, Corvo, we aren’t finished yet.”

If the Outsider still drew breath, Corvo’s sure he’d be able to feel the puff of air on his cheek. The last words of the shanty, the Outsider sings aloud:

“ _She made no sound, no word she said_  
_Lowlands, Lowlands away_  
_And then I knew my love was dead_  
_Lowlands away_.”

The Outsider doesn’t release him, but Corvo feels the shift all the same and wrenches his arm away. He stands shakily, resisting the urge to rub the still-burning Mark.

He doesn’t have to look at the Outsider to see his mockery.

“You don’t appreciate my gift, do you, Corvo?” The Outsider tuts. “Don’t feel obligated to keep it. It’s for your benefit, after all. If you would rather…”

The Outsider waves a hand, and Corvo’s Mark flashes, then goes dark. And Corvo is reminded of the wrenched knee, broken ribs, bruised back, the stitched-up gash slicing across his belly, the dozens of tiny scrapes and cuts and burns and the wracking cough that marred his body before — and he nearly crumbles with the agony of it as it all comes rushing back to him in the Mark’s absence.

But more than that, he is — hollowed out. Any vestige of stamina he had flees with the Mark, leaving an empty shell of a man with naught but a mask and a ruined name.

He realizes the Outsider is still talking. “.... how long it may take for your… injuries to catch up with you. Are you a betting man, Corvo?”

Corvo tries to draw breath to speak, but the ache in his ribs spikes and all that comes out is a tortured groan. The Outsider reaches his hand out, and Corvo fixates on the palm and the silent offering it presents.

Jessamine’s ghost still whispers at the edge of his hearing (though Corvo briefly considers it may be the runes making a fool of him) and he wishes he knew what she wanted, wishes he knew what she would do, in his stead.

The Heart begins speaking almost before his fingers brush against it, tucked in an inner coat pocket flush with his chest.

“ _My Lord Protector_ ,” the Heart breathes in a voice Corvo knows better than his own. “ _Her fate rests on your effort_.”

Corvo doesn’t look up when he places his Marked hand in the Outsider’s. His lingering pains fade as the Mark flares and the heavy weight of it twists through his veins, winding around his heart and settling in his gut.

“I didn’t think so,” the Outsider says softly, drawing back, something pleased curdling at the corner of his mouth.

The Outsider’s laugh follows Corvo as the abandoned apartment door swings shut behind him. “I’ll see you again soon, Lord Protector.”

The collar of Corvo’s coat is stiff with sea salt for days afterward.

**Author's Note:**

> The shanty the Outsider hums: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DlObhhN1kkk
> 
> A hundred thanks to AO3 user cosmoscorpse for cheering me on - I 100 percent would not have finished this without your support and feedback, my dude.
> 
> Also come say hello to me on Tumblr! I'm restivewit over there.


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